Robert Aldrich

A sadistic prison warden will make any sacrifice to push his prison guards' semi-pro football team to a national championship.

The U.S. is launching a major naval operation in the South Pacific in the spring of 1942, and to ensure the battle plans remain secret, a Japanese radio installation must be destroyed. To accomplish this task, an American officer is ordered by his commander to join a squad of British misfits on a suicide mission against the facility.